“Poops win prizes” and other things I never thought I’d say

Let’s face it, none of us really knew what we were letting ourselves in for with this parenthood lark, all of those hypothetical children we were raising, pre actual children, had excellent reasoning skills and the behaviour of little cherubs.

The harsh reality of parenting is obviously completely different. We find ourselves doing things we NEVER thought we’d do, not in a million years. Hurling ourselves around the ball pit in the soft play centre, debating the reasons why we really should wear a coat when it’s -10 outside and pouring with rain (Anna doesn’t wear one in Frozen you know!) And crawling around the floor in the dark at 2am looking for a missing dummy or favourite cuddly toy. Crawling around the floor in the dark at 2am, used to be induced by wine and the need to find somewhere comfy to sleep pass out!

Another key issue for me was sharing food from the same spoon as a child. I was adamant I could not and would not do this. If I saw a parent eating food from a spoon that had just been in their child’s mouth, or licking the drips from their child’s spitty ice cream I would physically gag. “I will never ever do that, it’s revolting, ” I would say.

Pah! Three children in, of course I have done that and much, much worse without so much as a second of nausea. Sometimes you are just too hungry to care.

I’ve also heard myself say so many things that my parents used to say to me like “don’t poke that, it’ll fall off,” and “Don’t pull that face, if the wind changes you’ll stay like that.” But there are thousands of sentence that I have said in my role as ‘mum’ that I would not have considered saying before I had children. Random words have been flung together, and they will only ever make sense in that moment, for that very specific incident.

Louise and I started this blog in 2016, after regular text exchanges that were full of random sentences we’d said that day. We found ourselves highly amusing and I would often be found laughing until I cried after reading some of Louise’s messages, so we started the blog to share them with other parents. (You’re welcome!)

I am adding to my repertoire daily, but I thought I’d take a moment to share my top 5 (so far)…

“Poops win prizes” – Oh man! When did my life become so glamorous? I’ve had so many conversations in the past 9 years about bodily functions, I may as well be a doctor. “Poops win prizes” is a well known phrase in our house for that stage in potty training where your child will happily wee on the potty all day long, but the second they suspect that something else might be brewing they will head anywhere but the potty! In the end I resorted to giving out prizes if poops made it into the potty and thus my catchphrase was born.

Here is a prime example of what happens when trying to get poops into the potty. This photo was taken by Louise when she was experiencing the same joys of motherhood! Poops win prizes people!!

2. “Why is there a plastic sausage in the toilet?” – I told you my life had reached new glamorous heights. As a mum I seem to spend a disproportionate amount of time in the bathroom extracting various items from the toilet. But this particular nonsensical phrase made me giggle so much that I couldn’t use my ‘stern’ mummy voice to deter future incidents! Why are children so attracted to the toilet?

Another day, another pile of random objects in my toilet!

3. “That’s not your water bottle – it’s the Guinea pigs” – I’m not sure why, but my youngest little treasure has a habit of licking the most disgusting things, (and yes, I do still share his ice creams)! Yesterday he had removed the water bottle from the guinea pigs’ cage and was merrily wandering around the garden having a little drink and I had to deploy this sentence. Strange boy!

4.” Why are your sandwiches in the washing machine?” – Sandwiches and food in general seem to be a great generator of random sentences, the possibilities are endless. Louise messaged me today with “take your sandwich out of your ear and eat it nicely!”

Food is also a good source of comedy sentences, because you will find it in strange places such as the washing machine, in your shoes and in Postman Pats’ special delivery van! Mrs Goggins will have a surprise if she looks in there!

5. “Yes, I am weeing from my fluff!” – I’m in the bathroom again! Sitting on the loo is like sitting in an interrogation chair in my house. If I dare to venture into the bathroom, I can guarantee that at least one of my inquisitors will follow and proceed to ask me any number of questions about what I am doing and whether or not I have a winky. However, my favourite little sentence from this ‘magical’ part of motherhood was when my one of the little darlings said “I know what that fluff is for now, it’s so you can have a wee!” Quite taken aback by these observations of my clearly inadequate pruning my response was “yes, I am weeing from my fluff!” I have nothing more to say about this one…

On that note I will leave you, but I’d love to know that I’m not alone. I’m sure you all have some stonking phrases you never thought you’d say. Please (really, please) leave us some comments to help this broken mum feel better about herself!